I am, right now, making two kilts out of a quite lightweight PV material. The stuff is a fashion plaid, but close enough to tartan as makes no difference. It's going to turn out to be "Sportkilt weight"...aka very light. I'm working on the first one.

Now, there's nothing wrong with a light kilt, but I have got to say that this stuff is a ROYAL PITA to machine-sew. It has no structure, it bunches up under the presser foot, it distorts all over the place under the needle. I am going to have to re-sew at least half of the pleats in this kilt. So I just gave up after re-sewing one pleat THREE times. I may resort to hand sewing, which was NOT the plan. So anyway, this leads me to write:

Alan H's Amateurs Guide to INEXPENSIVE Home Kiltmaking Fabric For Dummies

Hands down, the best thing to machine-sew sew a tartan kilt out of, on the cheap is the wool/poly 11 ounce blend stuff that Fraser and Kirkbright has in their remnants section. I have made four skirts and three kilts out of this stuff and I love it. I was excited to see that they have Black Watch currently on sale, then my balloon burst when I saw that the sett size was 3 inches...too small for a kilt. When shopping their offerings, make sure to look for sett size. They currently have the Lindsay tartan in a 6-inch sett. I'm wearing a kilt I made out of this stuff right now, and even though I did this one kind of "quick and dirty" it looks pretty darned good, if you ask me.

If you can find Marton Mills PV on sale, grab it. It's also just great, but fat chance of getting it for $6-8 a yard.. har!

The best thing for making a contemporary kilt is cotton/polyester blend twill in the 8-ounce-or-so range. These are available in solid colors off of ebay or most any fabric store for under ten bucks a yard.

What else is out there?

lightweight cheap flannel from Joannes...NO NO NO NO NO NO NO don't waste your time.

Bull denim... hard to sew in a thick waistband, but makes a bulletproof kilt....that will wrinkle like CRAZY. You simply can't sit down in it for more than ten minutes. But if all you want to do is stand around in it, or you don't care if it looks like the dickens from the backside, then go for it.

Lightweight poly-viscose from Joannes, Hancock, etc. I don't like it. I'm working on it, now, and yuck. I'll make this kilt look OK because I'm careful, but I won't buy this stuff again. YUCK.

Polyester camouflage....good stuff, I've used it and I like it. Do NOT get the ripstop nylon stuff!!!! NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

Honestly, you want to make a tartan kilt on the cheap? Go look at Fraser and Kirkbright, or their USA re-sellers, The Scottish Weaver, which also has a remnants section.. Both are on-line. The 50/50 poly/wool 11 ounce material is very nice stuff, and if you use 6 yards of it or more you'll get a nice kilt with a good "swish". Beware of the cotton/poly tartans. I haven't tried one yet, but I have my doubts...I just don't know.